Board of Education agenda continues wasteful, mindless privatization push while CPS budget looms for passage... Why does Chicago need to hire a New York corporation to do 'cash modeling' for its public schools (rather than its own Chief Financial Officer and her staff)?...
A close look at the Board Report which will get Chicago to pay at least a half million dollars to Ernst & Young reveals that the proposed deal is actually a "no-bid" contract. Above, the first page of the Board Report on the public agenda for the August 26, 2015 meeting of the Board. Nobody on the Board is likely to ask why the Board's own employees can't do their own "cash modeling services." Privatization continues to cost millions, dribbling out of the Board's finances month after month.When is a "no-bid" contract not a no-bid contract? Answer: When it's part of an intergovernmental deal. Five hours before the beginning of the August 26, 2015 meeting of the Chicago Board of Education, t's unlikely that any of the members of the Board will ask why the Board's workers can't do the "cash modeling" required for CPS to keep track of its own money. But by the time the day ends, the Board will have voted to give a half million dollars to Ernst & Young for work that should be done "in house." And despite the public outcries over so-called "no bid" contracts (the most famous of which is the $20.5 million SUPES deal that has gotten Barbara Byrd Bennett in trouble), the "new Board" under the "new" CEO will continue with no-bid and privatization deals without question.
The major agenda item on the public agenda for the August 26, 2015 meeting of the Chicago Board of Education is, of course, the passage of the so-called "Final Budget" for the 2015 - 2016 school year. Without any obvious irony, the leaders of Chicago Public School posted the budget which they will vote to approve for the public on Monday, August 24, 2015. It was part of the Board's agenda, more than 140 pages long. The longest items are the Budget and a new policy. But scattered throughout the Agenda are a dozen items which continue the wasteful policy of privatization which has escalated for Chicago's public schools since mayoral control began in 1995.
Among the items on the agenda that will cost millions and continue to lose money for the people of Chicago, while undermining the public schools are the following:
A Board Report will take a half million dollars in Chicago taxpayers' money to pay a major accounting firm to do work that should be done by Board workers. A close look at the Board Report which will get Chicago to pay at least a half million dollars to Ernst & Young reveals that the proposed deal is actually a "no-bid" contract. Above, the first page of the Board Report on the public agenda for the August 26, 2015 meeting of the Board. Nobody on the Board is likely to ask why the Board's own employees can't do their own "cash modeling services." Privatization continues to cost millions, dribbling out of the Board's finances month after month.
